


Snapped

by CouchNinja



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Anorexia, Anxiety, But what's new about my fanfics, Drug Use, Irondad, Near Death Experience, PTSD, Peter Parker Needs a Hug, Read at Your Own Risk, Sad with a Happy Ending, Self hatred to the max, Self-Harm, This is super sad, like really divergent, please be careful reading, probably just a one shot, spiderson
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-28
Updated: 2020-09-28
Packaged: 2021-03-07 18:55:20
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,335
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26692555
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CouchNinja/pseuds/CouchNinja
Summary: The Snap ruined everything. It stripped Peter of everything he cared about, and time isn't helping him heal. It's making it worse. He is on the edge, and he cannot come back from it on his own.AU where all the main Avengers were dusted/snapped/blipped/whatever you want to call it, and Peter is the only one left. He ends up working for SHIELD, but it is too much for him to take.Warning: Do not read if you may be triggered! This is a pretty dark fic that might be hard to read. It is very sensitive and should not be taken lightly.
Relationships: Peter Parker & Tony Stark
Comments: 6
Kudos: 42





	Snapped

**Author's Note:**

> Hello readers! I know I have a few other works going right now, so if you're coming from one of those be warned. This is darker than my other Peter Parker fic.
> 
> Writing characters falling apart helps me cope with my own mental problems. This is like my personal therapy. That is why I wrote this. Therefore....
> 
> WARNING: This could be very triggering! It contains self harm - leading to almost dying - drug addiction, and anorexia. The final scene is slightly graphic. I don't want anyone to fall into something that would harm them. If you think this might do that, please do not read! I beg of you to get some help - whatever that might be for you. It is very hard, but you are worth it. You are loved! You are important!
> 
> If you think this will be fine for your mental state, then buckle up, and enjoy this pit of sadness!

Peter inhaled sharply as he splashed the cold water on his face. With a sigh, he shook his hands, sending droplets flying through the air.

He leaned his elbows onto the sink as he ran his fingers through his hair. His mind was running wild, and there was nothing he could do to stop it.

He didn't know what to do anymore. He was a failure. He always had been, but it was just getting worse. He wasn't a hero. He never had been. If anything, he did more harm then good. I mean, look at what happened to the Avengers. He should have done more to stop it. If he had just tried harder. If he had just been stronger or faster. If he had been smarter. If he hadn't been a failure, they would all still be here. Thanos would have been defeated, and the world would be a better place.

But that's not what happened.

Thanos did snap, and he was the only one left now. 

~~~~~

It had been the most terrifying moment in his life. He had watched as the Guardians disappeared one-by-one into a pile of dust. In confusion, Peter had turned to Tony Stark - the man who was like a father to him. Peter didn't know what was going on, but Tony did. Wide-eyed, the man opened his mouth to say something - probably some false words of comfort - but he was cut short by his own disintegration. And just like that, he was gone. Peter had streamed and cried for what seemed like an eternity. His whole body shook violently with each sob. His voice had gone raw, and there were no tears left for him to cry. But it was no use. The man was gone. Everyone was gone.

In a state of shock and delusion, Peter had done nothing for days. He was completely numb. All he could do was stare into space, regret every decision he had ever made, hate himself, cry some, and then repeat the cycle.

Finally, something clicked inside him. It wasn't a conscious decision by any means. Peter's body acted on complete auto-pilot. It was probably some form of survival instinct kicking in. No matter what it was, it got him moving.

He scavenged around until he found a ship that wasn't completely toasted. After days of gathering parts and tinkering with them, he got the ship running. He set a course for earth, and began the long journey home.

This lasted a few months. At the time, Peter thought they were the worst months he could possibly have. He was wrong, of course, but he didn't know that yet.

He sat in silence, contemplating his own existence. He wished it had been him who was gone. Tony would be much more useful then him. He was just a stupid kid who got everyone close to him hurt or killed. He was useless in the grand scheme of things. He was just some lame neighborhood superhero. He would never amount to anything else. But Tony would have been useful. Tony would have found a way to bring everyone back by now.

Peter ran out of food in a matter of days. He felt himself slowly starving to death. His bones began to stick out more and more, and his body began to shut down. It was a horrible feeling, and yet he somewhat reveled in it. He felt like he deserved it. It wasn't like Tony was eating right now. Tony was gone. If Tony was gone, why shouldn't he be gone too?

When Peter finally got back to earth, he hoped things would get better for him. He assumed the rest of the Avengers were working on a plan to reverse everything and take down Thanos once and for all.

But he was wrong.

Peter stepped off the ship - which he might or might not have crashed - and looked around. He sat and waited for a while, hoping someone of importance would have seen him crashing the ship and come to get him. He was starting to think no one would come - after all, why would they? It wasn't like he was worth anything. He was just a useless kid. But then, he saw someone walking towards him. He stood up and facing the approaching man.

"Hello, Mister Parker."

"Mister Nick Fury, Sir. Hello." Peter looked around, trying to see anyone else who had come with the SHIELD director.

"If you're waiting for the rest of the Avengers to come, you'll be waiting a while," Fury said. If Peter didn't know any better, he would have said the man's one eye seemed to fill with tears. "You are the only hero left. Honestly, we thought all of you were gone too."

Peter was vaguely aware of himself falling to his knees. He had help onto that one shred of hope for so long. That even though Tony was gone, the rest of the Avengers were still there. They would fix everything. They would never want anything to do with him again, but at least the rest of the universe would be saved. But no. They were gone too. And it was all his fault. He should have done more. He hated himself for it. This world needed heroes, and he got them all destroyed due to his incompetence.

Peter couldn't exactly recall everything that happened after that. Apparently, Fury had explained to him that Aunt May had disappeared in the snap too. Therefore, Fury was going to take Peter in, and he would now live at a SHIELD base. So now, he not only had lost all his mentors and everyone he was close to - who also happened to be the only hope for setting everything right - but he was also being stripped of all of his old life. His friends. His school. His neighborhood. Everything. What little stability he had hoped for was non-existence.

Fury also had the grand idea to train him to be The Avenger. That's right. The boy who had gotten them all killed was now going to have to take over the role of every single Avenger. Fury said it was because the world needed hope and someone strong enough to take on the problems of the universe, but Peter didn't understand that. He felt like it was more of a punishment. A continual reminder of how much of a failure he was. Of how small he was in the grand scheme of things. Of how bad of a hero he was. How he was more like an anti-hero.

No matter the reason behind the action, it was horrible. Peter was continually bombarded with problems that should be handled by a whole team of adult, trained professionals and geniuses. But nope. It was all placed on the shoulders of a fifteen-year-old kid. Every time Peter tried to get help from Fury or Hill or any other adult, they seemed to brush him off. And if they did something, it made him feel horrible that he inconvenienced them with something he was clearly supposed to be able to handle on his own.

He had struggled with anxiety and finding his identity for as long as he could remember. When he first became Spiderman, those problems had greatly diminished. He found his place in this world. His purpose. He knew who he was. And even though he was throwing himself into dangerous situations, he found peace in doing so. He knew he was doing the right thing, so it was okay. But now, it had all come back ten thousand times worse. He had full blown anxiety attacks every day. When they came on, he completely stopped functioning. He couldn't breathe. He couldn't move. He couldn't think. He just sat there, growing more and more anxious because he knew he should be doing something about this but he couldn't. He was too weak. And having to act like a whole team of people did not help his identity crisis. He spent so much time pretending to be other people that there were moments he genuinely didn't know who Peter Parker was.

~~~~~

Peter lifted his head to look in the bathroom mirror. He saw a stranger's face looking back at him. Those eyes were so empty. They held so much confusion and pain. They were practically dead. And his face was so gaunt. Although, that's what happens when you've snapped.

I mean, who could blame him. With all the pressure he had on him? With all the building trauma? He had trouble with PTSD from watching Ben get murdered, and then from the Vulture, and now from Thanos and everything that followed. Could you really blame him for falling apart? Could you blame him for turning to desperate measures of release?

~~~~~

It had started after a particularly rough mission with SHIELD. A bunch of agents had died under his command. He hated himself even more than usual that night. He went out as Spiderman to kick some bad guy butt. He was very reckless. He didn't care though. So what if he got hurt? He deserved it after all the pain he had caused.

Around 1:00 in the morning, Peter spotted something sketchy in a dark alley. He moved in, listening to two men talking.

"So you promise this will take the edge off?" man one asked.

Man two chuckled. "Oh boy. Trust me. You won't feel a thing after taking this. I've never had anything else like it. It don't matter what you're trying to escape. You won't be able to focus on any of your problems for a good long while."

Peter knew it was wrong. He had seen the aftermath of drugs first hand on many occasions in his line of work. But there was something about the way the man described it that made it sound so enticing. That made it sound like it would fix all his problems.

Once man one had left, Peter hopped down into the alley. The dealer nearly had a heart attack.

"I... this isn't what... well.... um.... Please don't kill me."

"I'm not going to kill you," Peter replied.

The man blinked at him in confusion. "Oh. Yeah. Well.... I guess you're going to turn me in now then, huh?"

Peter's heart pounded in his chest. He felt his limbs shaking. He couldn't believe he was about to do this. Something this wrong and stupid. And in his Spiderman suit, no less. He really was a horrible person. He was a failure. 

He felt his lips moving, but he wasn't really controlling them. "I won't.... if you give me what you have."

He kept repeating this pattern for months. He would sneak out, find a drug dealer, and promise not to get them in trouble if they gave him drugs. At first, it was only on occasion. If he had a really bad mission, or the pressure of being The Avenger was just too much. 

But then he started to crave it. The feeling of temporary, fake bliss he received from those brief moments became all he wanted in life. So he sought them out more and more. It reached the point where completely consumed his mind. If he didn't get it, it would cause physical pain. He would get all antsy and sweaty. He wouldn't be able to focus on anything. He would feel sick to his stomach.

Soon after that, Fury found out. He was outraged. Long story short, he stripped Peter of his Spiderman suit and his hero title.

Peter couldn't blame him. He hadn't deserved it in the first place. He was worthless and a failure and all he ever did was get people hurt. But that didn't mean it didn't completely crush him.

Fury started giving him random tests and monitoring him strictly. Peter felt like a baby, and he hated it. But what else was new?

There were days Peter wouldn't even get out of bed. He had nothing to get up for after all. He couldn't do any good, and he was in so much pain because he couldn't get his fix. Worst of all, he could no longer escape his mind. He couldn't shut out all the pain and death he had caused. He couldn't shut out the hatred and the grief. He needed something - anything - to take the edge off.

Eventually, Peter decided to go to the gym. He remembered how he used to train with the Avengers and how great that would make him feel. That memory only made him feel more guilty because none of the people in those memories were here, and that was on him. But he still went anyway.

The workout was difficult. He had grown tremendously weaker. It probably had something to do with the fact that he was barely eating. And he had been abusing drugs. And he was just a piece of trash. 

When he went to put a particularly heavy weight back on the rack, it slipped out of his fingers and landed directly on his foot. Peter cried out in pain as he felt the bones cracking. He quickly rolled it off and sat down, stripping his shoe off to get a better look. 

His first instinct was to go to the infirmary. That's what you're supposed to do when you get injured. But as he sat there, looking at his throbbing foot, he found something soothing in the pain. It made everything else seem better. He deserved it, anyway. After all the pain he caused, he deserved some of his own. He stood up and began to walk on the injury. The pain of the first step nearly brought him to his knees, but he clenched his jaw and pushed through it.

There was something euphoric about being in control of his own pain. It was one of the few things he could still control in his life, and he would cherish it. He would use it. He would amplify it.

Now that he had a new - albeit damaging and stupid - coping mechanism, he could start working again. Fury didn't seem to suspect anything negative. He just saw that Peter could function again. Although, the man seemed too busy with some new favorite team and major mission to pay much attention to the young agent. Fury would send him on missions he requested. Peter always picked the ones that seemed like they would get him into the most physical harm. Then, when he got back, he would pretend he was in better condition that he was. He would lie about going to the infirmary. He would make sure he didn't get the help he needed so he could manipulate his pain. And if he didn't feel like he was in enough pain, he would take matters into his own hands.

~~~~~

That's how he ended up here. In the bathroom. Staring at a stranger in the mirror.

Robotically, he opened the cabinet and pulled out a razor. Before he knew it, he saw red. There was red everywhere. Suddenly, he was on the floor. Oh, wow. His vision was blurring, and his head was spinning. He felt queasy. He could feel his arms tingling. His nostrils were filled with a metallic scent. He realized his wounds must go way deeper than they normally did.

He lay on the floor in shock, trying in vain to think through what to do.

That's when he heard someone open his quarter's door and call his name. It sounded like it was at the other end of a tunnel. His ears were ringing, so it was hard to tell what was going on. He must really be on the brink because he swore it sounded like....

"Peter!"

The next thing he knew, there were arms around him, pulling him into someone's chest. He had to admit, the body heat felt nice. And so did the pressure on his arms. He glanced down and saw a really nice suit jacket becoming drenched in his blood as it wrapped around his arms. What a shame. Now he felt guilty for ruining this man's suit.

"Underoos. Hey, kiddo. I'm here. Just... let's... um.... gosh, I don't know what to do... um... Kid, why did you get us into this mess?"

Peter tilted his head back and looked into the face of them man talking. "Mister Stark?" He could have sworn the man who was holding him was his old mentor. The man he had loved. But that was impossible. Tony was dead. He had been dead, so he couldn't be holding him. Unless he was dead too, which honestly didn't seem like that outlandish of an option.

Apparently he had spoken his thoughts out loud as the man holding him replied. "No, kid, you're not dead. Neither of us are, and that's not going to change any time soon. You hear me?"

Peter shook his head. "I don't understand. You're gone. You've been gone. It was all my fault. Everything is my fault."

"Don't you do that. That's my job. I'm the one who blames myself for everything. You're the one who makes me feel better. You're the one who gives me reason to keep going. You're the one I'd give up everything for in a heartbeat. Now if you don't mind, I would like that position back."

Peter chuckled slightly at the remark. If he had been fully coherent, he would have realized it wasn't that funny. Peter was delusional, however, so it did seem funny at the moment.

"Okay. Okay. You know what?" Tony said. "We're gonna get you up and to some help. How about that?"

Peter shook his head, his head whipping around as he could barely control it. "I don't need it. I don't deserve it. Everyone dies because of me."

"What are you talking about kid? You're not making sense. Come on." Tony pulled Peter up. The weak boy provided very little resistance. "Gosh, kid! You're skin and bone. What have you done to yourself."

"I had to do something to myself. I couldn't handle being alone." Peter hadn't planned on being that blunt. In fact, he was rarely that honest with himself. But he supposed severe blood loss was a great way to get someone's guard down.

Peter could here Tony choking up as the shuffled out of the room. "You're not, kid. We're back. Goodness knows how Fury and his team did it, but we won."

Peter shook his head. "No. No. We lost. I failed, and everyone failed."

"Maybe the battle, but we won the war. So shut up and let me help you."

"I can't. I can't. I...."

"Don't you dare, kid. Don't you dare. You know what. I'mma be completely selfish right now. I'm not sure I can make it without you. So don't you dare leave me to myself."

Peter stiffened and blinked up at the man. His vision was still blurry, but he could make out the tears running down his mentor's face. All the man's prior attempts to snap him out of it fell flat. But that. That had stirred something in him. He knew that feeling, because he had felt the same way about Tony. And he never wanted Tony to feel that way because of him. He had caused enough pain in this world already. He didn't need to cause more.

"Okay."

"Okay?" Tony gave the boy a sad smile.

"For you."

"For me? Okay. That's great. Now. Let's get you some better help." Tony pulled Peter up more so he could more easily help him along.

In that moment, with Tony's body pressed against him, the man's chest rattling soothingly as he spoke comforting phrases, Peter knew for the first time in a long time that he wouldn't be alone anymore. He had hope. He had a reason to get better. He had a reason to stop throwing himself away.

And for the first time, he fully intended to.

**Author's Note:**

> As I said at the beginning, please get help if you need it. You are loved. You are not alone.
> 
> Anyway, I hope this story didn't bring you down, and you were able to embrace the sadness. Thanks if you made it this far.


End file.
